Do you know about NATO's plan to save Ukraine from Trump?

NATO is developing a plan to ensure that Donald Trump can't upend Western aid to Ukraine if he ends up winning the 2024 presidential election in November. The plan would put NATO in charge of a massive $100 billion fund to support Kyiv.

NATO is working on a five-year plan to secure a $100 billion dollar aid package that will be managed by the defensive alliance in an effort to protect Ukraine from the possibility of Trump taking office and cutting Kyiv’s assistance. 

Known as the Mission for Ukraine, the plan was put forward by General Secretary Jens Stoltenberg and would see NATO’s thirty-two member states commit the money, which would be coordinated by the alliance according to The Telegraph. 

“If approved, it would also give the alliance control of the US-led Ramstein weapons support group and see it manage the supply of lethal weapons to Ukraine for the first time since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022,” explained The Telegraph’s Henry Foy.

Stoltenberg pitched the new plan as a way to “shield the mechanism against the winds of political change” according to unnamed sources briefed on the plan and the alliance decided to move forward with it after talks on April 3rd. 

The foreign ministers of NATO member states met in Brussels as part of two days of meetings that saw the alliance celebrate its 75th anniversary and begin preparing for the group's upcoming Washington Summit that will take place in July 2024. 

Ministers discussed the possibility of preparing the $100 billion dollar aid plan that was proposed by Stoltenberg and agreed to move forward with the proposal that would put NATO in more control of aid to Ukraine, Stoltenberg said.  

NATO would not only control the purse strings to a large amount of money and weapons but it would also take a primary role in coordinating security assistance and training for Ukraine as well as providing the support Kyiv needed for the long term. 

“The Ukrainians are not running out of courage, they are running out of ammunition,” Stoltenberg said after the meeting according to a press release. “We discussed how to put our support on a firmer and more enduring basis for the future.”

Stoltenberg added that the details of the plan would take shape over the coming weeks and noted: “Ukraine can rely on NATO support now, and for a long haul." But why would such a plan be needed and what is the alliance worried about?

As some sources suggested, there likely is a real fear among the alliance’s members that Trump could be swept back into office in 2024 and then enact policies that would put the future of Ukraine at risk by withholding security assistance. 

However, one unnamed European official also told Newsweek that the reality of the war in Ukraine and the brutal nature of the fighting raised “alarm bells” for member states more than the prospect of a resurgent Donald Trump in the White House. 

“This happened before Trump 2.0 actually became a viable future," the official said. "I would rather say that a potential new Trump term is speeding up that process and stressing the importance of Europe's own defense capabilities."

Regardless of why NATO is making a move to take on a greater role in Russia’s war against Ukraine, it's still a serious step for the alliance that will put it at even greater odds with Moscow and could change the nature of the alliance. 

“This will be crossing a Rubicon. Nato will have a role in coordinating lethal support to Ukraine,” one diplomat said according to The Telegraph. “I see consensus emerging and I think it will be there by the time we get on the plane to Washington.”

If the Mission for Ukraine were to move forward it would need the support of all NATO member states, which could be a problem. Negotiations will likely take place over the coming months and two diplomats warned the final program may be scaled back. 

On May 8th, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto repeated his country's firm claim that Hungary would not take part in NATO's plan to develop a support fund for Ukraine during a Facebook live event in London according to Reuters.

"Hungary will stay out of NATO's crazy mission despite all the pressure," Szijjarto stated. In April, Hungarian government spokesperson Zoltan Kovacs noted on X that Hungary would not back the plan because it "might draw the alliance closer to war or shift it from a defensive to an offensive coalition."